In a Sri Lankan House of 225 members, the cut-off figure comes to 113. With Wickremesinghe side touching 102 and Rajapaksa's team at 101, the three-party Tamil National Alliance with 16 members and the left-leaning Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna with 6 members hold the key. But with the latter declaring that they will not support either formation in a vote count,that leaves the TNA as the deciding factor, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
'If the museum in his memory inspires and instils among Brahminical British Indians an attitude of equality towards Dalits, the edifice would be worth it,' reports Ashis Ray.
The Paris-headquartered FATF said Pakistan should continue to work on implementing its action plan to address its strategic deficiencies
With four contenders for the top post in case the BJP wrests power from AAP, party sources say naming of a CM face may trigger factional fights.
'Indian nationhood is indeed at the cusp of alarming redefinition -- hate-filled, and exclusionary.' 'Nations are not built this way, instead these are the ways of liquidating nations.' 'We must pre-empt it.' 'Can we?' asks Mohammad Sajjad.
A group of clerics today asked the government not to hold peace with the banned Pakistani Taliban after it condoned the recent bomb attack on a church in Peshawar that killed over 80 people.
'Why can't a country that builds and manages airports of acknowledged excellence at home and abroad produce passports of durable quality for its citizens?' asks Sunil Sethi.
'The BJP and RSS may realise it is much easier for the ICHR to rewrite textbooks and for the ICSSR to float its bizarre interpretations on social themes than to keep people away from their favourite dishes.'
Former ICC president and Test captain Zaheer Abbas believes Pakistan will eventually revive international cricket in the country. "I do not want to predict a time frame of international teams touring Pakistan, but I do hope over the next 2-3 years we could see them playing back in Pakistan," Abbas said. "When I used to sit on international forums as ICC president I used to talk a lot about it (cricket in Pakistan), but people didn't want to come due to their security concerns."
A small Hindu temple has been vandalized by unidentified men in Pakistan's southern Sindh province, leading to protests by the community members and local political parties.
The massive earthquake in Sichuan struck at 9:19 pm (local time) on Tuesday and the epicentre was monitored at a depth of 20 km, state-run Xinhua new agency reported.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had gone to China with a bagful of initiatives, but not all seems to have been fulfilled given China's reluctance to go the whole hog with him
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Tuesday
Finance Minister Abdul Rahim Rather's record run in Jammu and Kashmir Assembly ended on Tuesday when he lost from Charar-e-Sharief while his National Conference colleague Ali Mohammad Sagar equalled his feat of sixth consecutive victories by winning Khanyar seat.
The Opposition in the Pakistan Punjab assembly on Tuesday staged a walkout to protest against Saeed's detention.
'India, which climbed the escalation ladder first, has climbed down.'
'It remains unclear what Indian objectives have been realised in precipitating the crisis in the first instance last Tuesday,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'If the Chinese intent is to be gauged based on its aggression in the South China Sea, greater forays in the Indian Ocean, a hawk's attitude towards Taiwan, flying its fighters repeatedly over the Senkaku islands in the East China Sea and creating strategic assets globally, there would be a requirement for strategic partnerships for India,' says Brigadier S K Chatterji (retd).
Unlike football, which offends the sensibilities of some very conservative Muslims because it is normally played in shorts, cricket is played in long sleeves and trousers, in line with traditional dress codes. It also bears some resemblance to traditional Afghan children's games involving throwing and using sticks to hit smaller sticks or balls.
The Wuhan meetings signify an incremental shift in China's position on India as well as each country buying time for the next phase of bilateral relations, says Srikanth Kondapalli.
'Both Nehru and Patel were thorough gentlemen and whatever their differences never disrespected each other.' 'Neither Modi nor Rahul Gandhi has much in them to claim such legacies.' 'They are symptomatic of the sad days that have befallen the nation midwifed and contemplated by Nehru and Patel,' says Mohan Guruswamy.
With hardline commander Mullah Fazlullah at its helm, the Pakistani Taliban has vowed to launch a wave of revenge attacks and ruled out talks with the government.
'What Trump and Kim have demonstrated is that leaders need not remain prisoners of the status quo and they can, by showing the necessary will and courage, break out of the hang-ups and constrictions of the past and carve out a new pathway for themselves,' says B S Raghavan.
Prohibitory orders were imposed in Delhi and parts of Karnataka. Police kept tight vigil in Kerala. In Gujarat, 50 people were arrested for Thursday's violence.
President Pranab Mukherjee's recent visit to the Pacific Island nation is path-breaking, but much more needs to be done, says Dr Rahul Mishra.
Unlike in the presidential polls, victory might not have been complete, at least as yet, for Mahinda Rajapaksa's electoral rivals. While his one-time aide and confidant, Maithripala Sirisena, became president without any issues after defeating him, incumbent Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, who again may not command an absolute majority in the 225-member parliament, would have to count on his 'national government' concept to carry the day and the nation with him, this time round, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
CM Yogi Adityanath said the BJP was getting widespread support from the people.
If Indian PM boycotts the CHOGM, it is likely to add to Sri Lanka's bitterness. This would not help India's desire to add more depth and content to its relations with Sri Lanka but its ability to influence Sri Lanka's decision making process on the both strategic issues and on Tamil minority issues, says Colonel (retd) R Hariharan.
The Samajwadi Party on Monday struck a defiant note on the issue of suspension of IAS officer Durga Sakhti Nagpal, saying officials are punished whenever they do something wrong and the Centre can withdraw IAS officers from the state.
'Is Ansari flagging a genuine concern? Is a rectification called for?' 'And finally: Do minorities matter?' asks Shekhar Gupta.
Abbasi will run the government until Sharif's brother Shehbaz is elected as member of parliament
A white powder was found wrapped in a paper close to the seat of the Leader of the Opposition Ram Govind Choudhry.
Two Taliban suicide bombers struck a historic church in Peshawar Sunday, killing at least 78 people, including women and children, in the deadliest attack on the minority Christian community in Pakistan's history.
Amid souring ties, the president visited Beijing for three days. On his return to India, a hope of better ties has arisen, says senior correspondent R Rajagopalan, who travelled with Pranab Mukherjee to the Asian superpower.
There are still a few lingering issues towards the progress of India-China bilateral relations, the approach for dealing with each other seems to be quite different. With Modi-Xi bonhomie strengthening, it seems that India and China are ready to recalibrate their approaches towards each other, says Sana Hashmi.
Hamid Anasari's was not talking of reservation for the whole religious community to which he too happens to belong. Yet, sections of media chose to put words into his mouth and then subject him to the criticism he never deserved. This does not augur well for our media or democracy, says Mohammad Sajjad.
The families of the Muslim youth from Hashimpura who were shot dead 28 years ago had some committed supporters in their long struggle for justice.
The 'secularists'are more adept at the politics of intense and alarmingly exaggerated fear-mongering, as this kind of politics provides easy votes of Muslims without making them answerable for the concrete issues of poverty, unemployment, lawlessness, and of basic needs like roads, electricity, etc, which is exactly how Nitish Kumar was defeated in the elections, says Mohammad Sajjad.
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